CLOUD

5 Hybrid Cloud Myths Busted

Going into a hybrid project with eyes wide open will help you avoid common mistakes and reap the most benefits, says Interop speaker Bernard Golden.

Bernard Golden, VP of enterprise solutions at Enstratius, delivered a session at the Interop show last week on popular hybrid cloud myths and the real-world facts that disprove them.

1. The hybrid cloud is an extension of virtualization and converged infrastructure.The main problem with that assumption, Golden said, is that it doesn't include automation, which should be a major component of any cloud deployment. "We don't do infrastructure management. We do cloud management," he said.

Reducing the management burden and creating a runbook of processes and images is the key to reaping the most benefit from cloud environments, he said, and then he fielded questions from the audience about "letting the application guys loose" on cloud resources in a free-for-all. He responded with an overview of capacity planning and policy enforcement tools, but I think the sentiment behind the question is valid. Automated and on-demand provisioning is great on paper, but in the hands of overeager developers, it could turn into a resource suck.

2. You can create a hybrid cloud using one, homogeneous standard.Golden asserted that there is no uniform environment. Hybrid environments will comprise some combination of VMware, Azure, OpenStack and AWS resources in uneasy coexistence. Each brings different image formats, management tools, support contracts and bandwidth requirements. It seems like a bleak picture, but that's why multi-cloud management suites are becoming critical.

3. Hybrid clouds are for enterprises.In fact, hybrid environments should be seen as flexible tools, not complex infrastructure schemes, Golden said. They can be SLA-indifferent, depending on what's being hosted, and they should be driven primarily by business units looking for agility. Static, long-term commitments should be relegated to the mists of history. "You don't know how an app will behave or what it will need, so don't worry about it. When you rent a car, you don't worry which brand of oil Hertz uses."